Do You Know What What Every Button On Your Car's Climate Control Does?

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Learn how to optimize your climate control.

A car's HVAC controls are something that most drivers tend to pay little attention to. Heating, ventilation and air conditioning in cars seems pretty self explanatory, but there are a lot of functions that many people don't actually understand. Cnet's Brian Cooley likes to do a deep dive on different tech features in new cars. In this how-to video, Cooley goes through all of the buttons and settings that are used to control an HVAC system. You may be surprised to learn what some of those buttons that you never push actually do.

Cooley breaks down HVAC into five buckets; manual or auto mode, single or dual zone, flow controls and recirculation, fan speed and temperature. You have to understand all five to become an HVAC expert.

Our favorite lessons were to use recirculation to help cool down a really hot car faster and that not all temperature settings are the same. 71 degrees may not feel the same in a GM car as it does in the Alpina B7 that Cooley uses in the demonstration. HVAC is not something that most people pay attention to, but it pays to know how to use a car's climate control to its best.